Regulation and Social Threats

Following a brief historical look at the Social Psychology laboratory in the Institute of Psychology, Université Paris Cité, the article presents some of our research on the topic of social threat. Our research examines threat and its regulation at the individual and collective levels. That is, threat can be perceived by individuals as targeting them personally, for example their positive self-image. Threats can also be perceived by individuals as targeting them as members of a group. These include our research on stereotype threat and system justification. The regulation of threats may also involve different strategies and resources as a function of whether it concerns the individual’s personal or collective identity. Strategies such as selective recall and the construction of possible selves are studied at the level of individual threat, whereas intergroup contacts and activation of justifying ideologies are investigated at the collective level.